By Mrunal Raiborde

“Play is the highest form of research.” – Einstein

The above quote sheds light on a very important aspect of childhood that is almost neglected in schools and households nowadays.

The biggest error we as educators and parents are making, is in separating play from learning and confining learning to closed spaces.

In our endeavour to promote learning through play, we have been concentrating on outdoor classrooms; where all the subjects for classes nursery to standard IV are taught through an activity-based format in our open garden area. Each class gets a minimum of 3 periods to a maximum of 9-10 periods each week for the same.

When we first read about the Outdoor Classroom Day Campaign, we were very excited to connect with like-minded professionals who are passionate about learning through play in the outdoors. Since 2017, we have been associated with the campaign through Action for Children’s Environments (ACE) Trust, who is leading the Outdoor Classroom Day India Campaign.  This has helped us concentrate our efforts with lesson plans for better learning outcomes.

What we educators have observed is a high level of enthusiasm in students. The students are very excited to learn and are very open to novel ideas in this setting. We also gathered that student learning outcomes were very high in comparison to the closed classroom setting.

The open set-up gives them freedom to think, stretch, move around, and innovate. Somehow, the typical classroom set-up brings boredom and monotony into the system – both for the educator and the learner.

Learning and teaching in the outdoors has had a positive effect in the teachers too, as they come up with wonderful teaching-learning techniques that the students enjoy and benefit from.

The garden-setting – with lush green trees, birds chirping, open skies, butterflies fluttering, and the fragrance of flowers; brings a calming effect on both the educator and the learner. This has also helped our differently–abled students to learn better and engage better.

This year, I was part of a 6-week long action research programme focused on play as a tool for learning. The learning was huge for me and being a part of this programme reaffirmed my faith in play. The path of outdoor classroom days taken by us is what is going to help us help our students to forge a bond with their fellows, to promote team-building, create and experiment, inculcate in them a love for nature and to simply learn to enjoy themselves.

We, at Vanita Vishram Primary School, Mumbai look forward to celebrating this year’s Outdoor Classroom Day when we will join our peers and colleagues all over the world in celebrating childhood learning in its very element.

I’d like to encourage all educators and  parents to please promote and support this wonderful initiative taken up ACE Trust for the harmonious development of our children.

Mrunal Raiborde is an educator, who for the last 16 years has been actively endorsing creative teaching methods and teaching creativity as a means of learning to her students. She is the Headmistress of Vanita Vishram Primary School, Mumbai and a Play Ambassador for PlayFutures.